“I’m just tired today.” I took a small sip of my drink. If I hadn’t had to keep my wits about me, I probably would have tossed the entire glass back like a shot and immediately repeated the process.
She gave me a sad smile. “I have so many regrets, you know? I hadn’t seen Jenny in almost two months before she died. I’d been really bad about seeing anyone, really, since Caleb was born,” she said, referring to her third child.
It wasn’t just her. Our friendship circle had casually unraveled around the time Sonia had become part of the one percent. When I ran into Jael at Jenny’s memorial service, it had been nearly half a year since she and I had last gotten together, and I’d almost not recognized her at first. She’d lost weight—a combination of nonstop nursing and no time to eat, she said apologetically, probably because motherhood had the opposite effect on me—and her black hair was streaked with gray. Her face was bare, and brambles of fine lines had formed around her eyes. She looked decades older than the last time we’d met up, as though the years of her life had all shown up at once.
“Listen, we’ve all been bad about getting together,” I told Jael. “Don’t beat yourself up.”
“Yes, but I avoided Jenny for the wrong reason. I felt so guilty about getting pregnant with Caleb when she’s had such a struggle because of her endometriosis. And you know, with forty just around the corner . . . it seemed like that chapter of her life was over. That must have been hard on her and Matt.”
I paused, my wineglass halfway to my mouth, wondering how to respond. I knew Jenny had wanted another child, but she had also said she had come to love their family of three exactly as it was.
Now I had to wonder if that was the whole story.
“That’s what it was, wasn’t it?” Jael said suddenly. “The hormones she was taking. I read that they can cause fatal blood clots in women over thirty-five.”
“It’s possible,” I fibbed.
“I bet it was,” she said, nodding. “When I told Jenny I was pregnant again, she said they had moved past it a long time ago. But I don’t know if that’s something you can ever really move past, especially when it doesn’t work out. My sister had secondary infertility, and it was really hard on her, even after she ended up having another child.”
“At least Jenny and Matt didn’t mind trying.”
Jael gave me a funny look. “What do you mean?”
“They were like rabbits.” I quickly amended myself: “Well, maybe not rabbits.”
“Because rabbits make lots of babies.”
“Sorry—that was me sticking my foot in my mouth,” I said, embarrassed. “But you know how Jenny was always talking about how they did it every day when he was home—sometimes even twice a day. Sanjay and I haven’t been like that since we were in our early twenties.” I hesitated, then added, “He wants us to have sex more often.”
Jael rolled her eyes. “Men. If I’ve learned one thing, though, it’s that having to do it saps the joy right out of it. Tony and I only ever had to try with Rachel,” she said, referring to her eldest. “But it was the worst . In my experience, the fastest way to murder your libido is to remove spontaneity from the equation.”
My husband’s direct request was hundreds of miles south of spontaneous—but that was my fault. “I can definitely see that,” I said, staring into the red abyss of my wineglass.
“Sanjay,” I whispered.
He was asleep on our bed, as straight and still as a log. I straddled him and leaned forward. I was wearing the tight White Sox T-shirt he loved and a pair of navy underwear. The underwear had a tiny tear where the polyester lace met the elastic band, but that was in the back and it was dark and hey, at least I was trying. “Hi,” I whispered, trying to rouse him.
“Hi,” he mumbled, opening an eye. Then the other one sprang open. “You smell like wine.”
“It’s my new perfume,” I said saucily. Jael and I had chosen a restaurant within walking distance of both of our houses, so I’d decided to have a second glass, and, following Jael’s lead, a third. Now my bedroom was swaying ever so slightly. But when I’d walked in the door, I’d had a spontaneous thought: tonight would be the night I would give it the old college try.
And damn it, I was going to enjoy it.
He pushed himself up on his elbows and looked at me. “You look really good.”
I wanted to remark that this was because my T-shirt covered my stomach, but I was just clearheaded enough to curb my sarcasm. “Thank you,” I said in a tone of voice I had not used in a long time.
Then I leaned forward and kissed him. At ten at night he already had morning breath. That didn’t bother me nearly as much as his stubble, which felt like sandpaper against my chin. I would not be so easily thrown off course, though, so I adjusted my face and kissed him again. This time it wasn’t nearly as irritating, and he now tasted a little like wine, too. Victory.
My hair fell around our heads, blocking out the pile of clothing next to the bed and the watchful eyes of Stevie’s stuffed koala, which she had discarded on our dresser. There was only me and Sanjay, whose arms were soft yet taut beneath my fingers and whose skin smelled like soap, which had always turned me on. Maybe this list idea wasn’t so ill conceived, after all.
“What did I do to deserve this?” he murmured.
Was this a trick question? The answer was nothing. It was also that he had agreed to sign on to the fix-our-marriage project. “Less talking,” I whispered.
“Okay,” he said.
“Still talking.”
“Sorry.”
“Shhh.” I kissed him again. Then I pushed my hips into his and took his hands and placed them on my breasts. He lingered there, almost like he was reacquainting himself with my body (which I suppose he was). Then he tugged my shirt over my head. Happily, I was no longer thinking about what was jiggling or whether my underwear would rip more if I leaned in the wrong direction. This wasn’t bad at all. In fact, I was on my way to liking it.
I realized Sanjay’s eyes were on my face. He was looking at my forehead, probably wondering if the faint lines between my eyebrows indicated I was only going through the motions. His gaze drifted to my lips. Was my pursing a pucker—or evidence I was ready to get this over with?
A little of both. I wondered if he could tell.
Then he looked into my eyes, and somehow that made me feel as naked as I ever had. I didn’t want him to read me; I didn’t want to connect on a deeper level. Because one minute I’d be thinking about how I loved my husband, and the next, I’d be crying over my dead friend. No, what I wanted—what I needed —was surface-level intimacy. Hormones. Pheromones. Good old shut-eyed, emotion-free lust.
I rolled off of him.
“What is it?” he said, still lying beside me. He propped himself on an elbow. “Did I do something wrong?”
“Not at all. I just wanted to switch it up.” I pulled him on top of me and then gently took his shoulder and pushed him down. I watched the top of his head make its way past my stomach and dip between my legs. Then I couldn’t say anything else because my dead zone had just shocked me with a sign of life.
And then there was another sign and a wave of pleasure, at once familiar and surprising. Maybe the wine had been a good idea, because I didn’t think about Sanjay’s ten o’clock shadow chafing my thighs or that we were doing this, well, sort of because he had asked me to, or that I literally couldn’t remember the last time he had done this particular thing to me. For a few minutes, I was able to let go of everything.
But then, out of nowhere, I began doing marital math in my head. I was making progress on Sanjay’s request (finally). Which was fantastic, but I was still coming up short. He had been doing the dishes and making lunches—not well, but at least he was doing it. Just the day before I’d caught him wielding the minivacuum like he was on payroll at Molly Maid. And the same day we had traded lists, he had done the impossible: folded the laundry and put each piece into its correct drawer.
In a split second, my pleasure withered into nothingness.
“Hang on,” I said to Sanjay. “I need a minute. Sorry.”
His head surfaced. He looked confused.
“I was really enjoying it, but then I started thinking about the wrong thing and—I’m sorry. It’s really not you.”
“If it’s not me, who were you thinking about?” he asked with a lopsided grin.
I couldn’t help but laugh, and then I was glad that I did because the fog started to lift. I wasn’t turned on anymore, but that didn’t mean I was done making progress. “Where were we?” I said, guiding Sanjay up toward me.
I began pulling his boxers down, but he stopped me. “No, it’s okay.”
“Why not?” I said.
He made a face. “That was nice. Let’s leave it at that and try again another time.”
“Really?” I said. “Do you not want me to succeed?”
He pulled his head back. “Is that the only reason you wanted to do this?”
“No,” I said. “I was trying to be spontaneous. But then I started thinking about how you’re doing so well and I’m, um, not.”
He turned off the lamp on his nightstand. “This isn’t a contest, you know.”
“I know,” I said.
But what I really knew was that “This isn’t a contest” was something winners said to make losers feel better.
The next morning, I stood in the kitchen surveying Sanjay’s success. The dishes were done and the counters, while hardly sparkling, were cleaner than they’d been since Riya’s last visit. In less than a week Sanjay had already aced one of my three requests. Granted, he had not secured a job yet—which was fine, I knew that took time—but if the man was willing to sanitize the sink, it was feasible that he could eventually solve world peace if he were so inclined.